Can't get pc to shutdown automatically..

[Ora]

I unable to get my pc to shutdown by clicking 'start' and 'shutdown' When I click on the 'shutdown' option it flashes for a moment like it's going to begin but the pc remains with the desktop on. I have to manually shut it down which causes the scandisk to run when I start it up again.

There are no viruses, running Symantic, SpyDoctor and Spyware Blaster and it's clean at least as far as these diagnostics reveal.
Anything I can do..?
Thanks, Ora

[Ora]

While waiting for an answer I did a search here for this problem and thought I would try the start, misconfig and see what is listed there that might be a problem based on what I read. The only thing that was familiar was something called ptsnoop. So I unchecked it and then chose to restart the machine which to my surprise it did by itself. It restarted okay. But when I went to 'start' and asked it to shut down, all was running okay and then it hung for about 2 mts and finally a screen came up which said, it is safe to shut down your pc. So I shut it down manually.

Is there anyway to fix this? I seem to have traded a pain in the neck for a pain....
Ora

[winsong]

If you are running Windows 98 - here is a possible solution:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/196008/en-us

If you are running Windows 98SE, here is the Microsoft 'Shutdown' troubleshooting link:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/238096/EN-US/